Generation Desperation

Wealth, poverty, and what it means to live a ‘good life’: this is the must-read story for fans of The Trading Game and The Psychology of Money.

‘A fantastically compelling personal story that is also the story of a generation . . . Told with perfect timing.’ – SIMON KUPER

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AFTER THE RISE, THERE COMES A FALL.

In 2020, Alexander Hurst was 29 years old and broke, living as a writer in a cramped Paris flatshare. There were murmurs that a global pandemic was coming. Financial stability seemed unattainable, so far removed from his reality – the reality of the generation who came of age during the 2008 financial crisis.

On a whim, he poured his meagre savings into highly risky options trading. Within a year this small set of stocks was worth $1.2 million. Enough to turn his life on its head – but not in the way he had imagined, as he began a slow-motion descent into losing it all.

In exploring Alexander’s remarkable rise and fall from wealth, Generation Desperation grapples with the vital questions of our age: what do class and status mean in a late-stage capitalist society? Can everyone really build the life they want? Or is there a cost to pursuing money above everything?

Generation Desperation is an urgent, unmissable fable for our times.

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‘Has an appealing timelessness . . . Hurst weaves the personal and the generational together with seamless ease in a thrilling book.’ – SEB EMINA

‘A riveting, tender, and painfully timely epic about what really matters.’ – ANGELICA FERRARA

‘Clever and brutally honest.’